City Hears the State of the Schools

From STAFF REPORTS

11:08 am | September 28, 2012

[Updated Friday, Sept. 28, 2012 | 1:00 p.m.] Â Pasadena Unified School District (PUSD) Board of Education President Renatta Cooper said that the state of the district is â€œhopefulâ€ in the annual State of the Schools address Friday morning.

The early morning event was held this year at Blair Middle School and was attended by about 170 school and city officials and community leaders.

The implications of the state’s education budget woes ran through Cooper’s speech.

â€œWe know what needs to be done,â€ said Cooper in her address. â€œWe have more research than weâ€™ve ever had to tell us what needs to be done to improve education for children in our country. Ad now because of fiscal matters â€“ particularly in this state of California â€“ weâ€™re doing the opposite.â€

â€œWe know â€“ we knew before we got in the crisis â€“ that we had shortest school day of any western industrialized country in the world,â€ continued Cooper. â€œ220 is the average international. Ours is 180. And weâ€˜ve gotten permission to cut it to 175. Now, thatâ€™s going the wrong way â€“ we need a longer school day, and a longer school year. And we are going in the opposite direction not because itâ€™s what good for kids, just because it will save money.

Gundry focused on PUSDâ€™s intention to emphasize â€œ21st century learningâ€ to ensure that Pasadena moves forward in the current educational environment.

â€œThe school board has adopted the basic framework for 21st century learning,â€ said Gundry in his message. â€œThis means that we are going to infuse in our classroom and across our curriculum communication skills â€“ teaching our kids strong oral and written communication skills; the ability to collaborate effectively with others â€“ the ability to work together to accomplish common goals; the ability to think critically in a higher level than theyâ€™ve been doing; creativity and innovation.â€

â€œThe board has adopted those as framework for delivery of instruction in all of our classrooms around the PUSD,â€ added Gundry.

The event was held at one of PUSD’s newest and most beautiful campuses, Blair Middle School. Students in the high school’s Culinary Arts and Hospitality Academy prepared and served breakfast to the attendees before the program.

The PUSD Board President is required by the Pasadena City Charter to annually deliver a State of the Schools Address on or before September 30.

â€œThese are your schools. These are your kids,â€ called Cooper in her closing statement. â€œDonâ€™t cheat them of the opportunity that we were all afforded. California has moved from being among the first to the worst. All within my lifetime â€“ and Iâ€™m not that old.â€